I remember how it was -- JR
Harvard’s Cave-In to Human Rights Watch Is Part of a Bigger Problem
The decision by the dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard to reverse his veto of a fellowship for Kenneth Roth, the ex-head of Human Rights Watch, should dismay those long concerned by the group’s disproportionate criticism of Israel. One may have questions about Israeli policies, but Human Rights Watch is not one for nuance.
In April 2021, it issued a 213-page report that Israeli authorities are committing “crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution against millions of Palestinians.” In contrast, the group, though harshly critical of Chinese policy toward Muslim minorities, does not go so far as to term them a crime against humanity.
Even if Dean Douglas Elmendorf of the Kennedy School (where I served as Director, Case Studies, between 1987 and 2006), had not yielded to public pressure to reinstate Roth, it would not have resolved the underlying problem represented by groups such as the Carr Center for Human Rights, the school’s center which proposed the fellowship for Mr. Roth.
The Center is one of many quasi-research entities which have sprung up at universities across the country whose purposes are more causist than scholarly. The Carr Center cites its purpose as “research, teaching, and training in the human rights domain.”
In practice, this vague language leads to such publications as “Not My AI: Towards Critical Feminist Frameworks to Resist Oppressive AI Systems” which aspires to “help us question algorithmic decision-making systems that may be racist and patriarchal, shifting to a future that is more focused on equity and social-environmental justice.” A worthy goal perhaps but hardly a detached and scholarly one.
The Carr Center, moreover, is far from alone in emphasizing advocacy over scholarship. Boston University is the home of the Center for Antiracist Research, led by Ibram X. Kendi, who is said to be “leading an antiracist movement for social change.” The Center says it includes “scholars, advocates, and thought leaders, all of whom bring to the table a relentless commitment to social justice.”
Race in America is without doubt a proper focus of research for a range of academic disciplines. The Antiracist Center, though, is clear about distinguishing itself from such: the “Center fosters an interdisciplinary approach to identify comprehensive solutions beyond the reach of most academic institutions that primarily focus on research.”
There are, it should be noted, similar centers at American University (Antiracism Center); the University of Southern California (USC Race and Equity Center); Temple University (Center for Antiracism); the University of Michigan (Center for Racial Justice).
To be fair, it is also the case that causes associated with political conservatives have their own academic homes. The University of Arkansas hosts the Center for Education Reform, which has long championed charter schools and school choice more broadly. Its work includes a “parental power index,” rating the extent to which “your state empowers parents and educators to foster the best education environment for students.”
One may well applaud such efforts — I do ‚— but they still must be distinguished from, say, a professional school for future teachers or detached research. The list of advocacy centers in academe goes on. Princeton hosts the Eviction Lab, which “creates data, interactive tools, and research to help neighbors and policy makers understand the eviction crisis.” The key assumption: that there is such a crisis.
Wake Forest hosts the Center for the Study of Capitalism, where “we believe well-functioning free markets act as a force for positive change and progress.. . .”
New York University has its “Center for Environmental and Animal Protection, a research unit to inform policy related to these linked societal and scientific concerns.”
“The nexus of animal agriculture, climate change, and conservation represents one of the most pressing and least understood threats to a sustainable future and will be a main focal point of the Center’s activities,” says Dale Jamieson, the Center’s founding director. It’s a long way from being an agricultural extension service for farmers.
Dean Elmendorf is facing criticism that he has been influenced by donors with Zionist leanings. All the Centers above, though, have their donors with their own favorite causes, all looking to have the stamp of university approval. The BU Antiracism Center, say,has been backed by the Open Society, Ford, Gates and Casey Foundations.
The Gates, Ford, and Chan Zuckerberg Initiative all support Princeton’s Eviction Lab. The Carr Center reflects the fact that an individual donor—tech mogul Greg Carr—can establish a Center at Harvard to further his world view. Whatever one’s views of these various causes, they all reflect advocacy over scholarship. Their presence is, what’s more, not unrelated to debates about free speech on campus. When university-approved centers are established with explicit goals, students must inevitably think twice about criticizing them. It’s a long way from John Stuart Mill.
https://www.nysun.com/article/harvards-cave-in-to-human-rights-watch-is-part-of-a-bigger-problem ?
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School Choice Movement Declares Victory in Iowa
Iowa has become the first state in the nation to pass a school choice measure this year, an education savings account plan championed by Governor Reynolds.
A school choice advocate at the Heritage Foundation, Jason Bedrick, called the new law “a major win for families looking for education freedom and choice.”
Dubbed the Students First Act, the legislation flew through the state legislature after the governor introduced it earlier this month.
The recently re-elected Ms. Reynolds signaled throughout election season that school choice would be a top priority during the state’s spring legislative session.
She endorsed a handful of political newcomers in Republican primaries against incumbent holdouts on her school choice agenda after failing to pass similar legislation last year. In four districts, Ms. Reynolds’s endorsees ousted incumbents in primaries and went on to win the general elections.
The bill passed in the state senate early Tuesday morning, and Ms. Reynolds signed it into law at the start of the workday.
“Public schools are the foundation of our educational system, and for most families, they’ll continue to be the option of choice, but they aren’t the only choice,” Ms. Reynolds told a crowd at Des Moines on Tuesday. “With this bill, every child in Iowa, regardless of ZIP code or income, will have access to the school best suited to their individual needs.”
The school choice program takes the form of education savings accounts, which have become the taxpayer-funded scholarship of choice in recent years.
In Iowa, students will have access to about $7,600 — roughly equivalent to what Iowa pays per-student in public schools — to spend on education-related costs.
Per its title, the funds are disbursed in savings accounts. Funds roll over from year to year, which proponents see as an advantage by incentivizing economization in education spending.
“The idea is that it gives families a much greater degree of freedom and flexibility,” Mr. Bedrick of the Heritage Fund told the Sun. “Often they’re used for tuition, but they can be used for things like tutoring, textbooks, homeschool curricula, online learning, special needs, and more.”
Iowa’s ESA program will phase in over the course of three years. In the upcoming 2023-24 school year, savings accounts will be available for low-income families and families seeking to leave the traditional public school system.
In the second year, eligibility will expand to include more middle class families. By the 2025-26 school year, it will be a universal education savings account program, much like Arizona’s.
While the new head of state in Arizona is trying to repeal its program, other states are following Iowa’s lead. Governors and Republican-held legislatures in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, and Idaho are eyeing similar legislation in the coming year.
In Florida, the first house bill of the legislative session would make universal its education savings account program, another feather in the cap of the Sunshine State’s education agenda if passed.
https://www.nysun.com/article/school-choice-movement-declares-victory-in-iowa
*************************************************Arizona Senate Panel Debates Parental Rights & School ‘Pronouns’ Bill
The Arizona state Senate Education Committee met Wednesday to consider SB 1001, The Given Name Act, a one-page, 21-line bill that states that any individual involved in the Arizona public education system would be required to use the pronoun associated with a student’s biological sex unless the student’s public school or charter school received other instructions from the student’s parent or parents.
No public or charter school staff member, full time or contractor, would be able to use alternative pronouns for a student without the written permission of the student’s parents.
The legislation would reinforce parents’ ultimate authority in deciding what names their children should and should not be called by staff members, providing a stopgap via parental approval before public districts attempt to treat or affirm gender dysphoria with only the minor’s limited understanding of what they are going through.
State Sen. John Kavanagh, Scottsdale Republican, the sponsor of SB 1001, said that if a child had serious psychological distress as a result of the gender dysphoria he or she was dealing with, then parents need to be alerted immediately so that the child can be given immediate medical and psychological care parents deem necessary.
Kavanagh disputed the common counterargument that many parents would be unsupportive and would therefore be a danger to their “transgender child.”
“The vast majority of parents will want to help their child,” he said, “What a horrible condemnation of the average American parent” to suggest otherwise. He added that Child Protective Services was still obligated, as always, to investigate any concerns of child abuse.
At no time during the committee hearing was Kavanagh’s concern for the high rate of student-suicide correlation addressed by Democratic members.
State Sen. Sally Ann Gonzales, Tucson Democrat, said, “For lots of indigenous children, their names were changed without parental permission—Maria got changed to Mary, Roberto got changed to Robert. I think that’s wrong for that to be happening. I’m not sure what the intent is for allowing … contractors and employers also not to say their names.”
Kavanagh responded that the bill would allow students to go by nicknames.
State Sen. Christine Marsh, Phoenix Democrat, suggested that the bill would go against the rights of parents who might agree with a child wanting different pronouns. “What if the parent agrees to a child having alternative pronouns?” she asked.
Kavanagh countered by citing the first sentence of his bill, which states that parental permission would allow a child to go by whatever pronouns the parent wishes.
Marsh took issue with the second portion of the bill, which states that a teacher or contractor could not be required to use a student’s pronouns, protecting their religious and moral liberties. She said that as a teacher for 33 years, she never had to fall back on “religious beliefs” as a standard for how she would respond to a student. “Are there other examples or situations in which a teacher’s religious beliefs override the parent’s?” she asked.
Kavanagh responded with an example of a Jewish or Muslim cafeteria worker being exempt from having to serve pork to students at school lunches. He also cited dress code considerations for students of different religions. After providing those examples, Kavanagh asked whether Marsh would agree with him that parents should be notified of potential mental health issues associated with gender dysphoria.
“No, I don’t agree, I just want the hypocrisy of the bill to be pointed out,” Marsh replied.
Several testimonials were offered by concerned parents, students, and activists, both for and against the bill.
One educator from Scottsdale praised the bill, claiming that as a Jew, she has religious objections to using pronouns or names that conflict with a student’s biological sex.
One activist claimed that parents should be involved and be aware of what their kids are going through, but suggested that students should be allowed to decide when their parents are ready to find out about it.
One critical point ignored by those opposing the bill is the inability of a minor under severe mental distress to safely self-treat gender dysphoria or any severe mental health issue or trauma. Encouraging minors to decide how best to treat themselves sets a dangerous precedent—and risks a very real threat of suicide or self-harm without the parent having an opportunity to aid his or her child.
One transgender advocate claimed that “no one commits suicide because they are gender dysphoric,” but implied that bullying was the cause.
While 20.2% of students claim to have been bullied, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, 8.9% have admitted attempting suicide. In contrast, while 51% of transgender individuals have claimed to be victims of bullying, 40% of transgender individuals admitted attempting suicide.
One opponent of the bill called Kavanagh “Senator Coward,” during his testimony, to which Kavanagh quipped, “You’re free to call me that [under this bill], as long as you get written permission from my parents.”
With only a one-seat advantage on the Senate Education Committee, Republicans will likely revise The Given Name Act and clarify a few points of language via amendments over the next several weeks.
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My other blogs: Main ones below
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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